Kicking and Screaming
by Dropkicking Bullet Shells
Summary: Their love is violent, angry and possessive. It is unhealthy. That doen't mean it isn't there. AU Shane/Daryl songfic


**A/N-** The song's 'Kiss with a Fist' by Florence + the Machine. This is my second attempt at Shane/Daryl (my other story being benched, though not forgotten) but this is a one-shot so I think I'll finish it ;)

**Plot-** Their love is violent, angry and possessive. It is unhealthy. That doen't mean it isn't there. AU Shane/Daryl songfic

**Disclaimer-** I do not own The Walking Dead.

**Warnings-** Language, domestic violence, adult themes, etc.

**Pairing-** Shane/Daryl

XxxX

"You're not sick you're just in love."  
_Irving Berlin_

XxxX

**Kicking and Screaming-**

_You hit me once_

Shane doesn't want to feel like this for Daryl. He doesn't want to feel anything for Daryl. Shane wants to sleep soundly, he wants to think clearly, to fuck carelessly, to breathe normally, but he can't do any of that when that hick's around.

He used to be able to satisfy his needs. When he wanted to drink he would drink. When he wanted a high he would fight. When he wanted to grind he would pick up some pretty stranger and take them home. But, he can't do any of that when that hick's around.

That hick is always breathing down his neck and hissing in his ear, clawing at the back of his mind and driving Shane insane. Shane's not sure what it is about that redneck, but he wants it to stop. He wants it to all stop. To disappear. He wants to stop getting goose bumps and he wants to stop the shudders. He wants to stop his eyes from rolling back into his head and he wants to keep his lids from fluttering closed. He wants to go into his room and fuck 2B's brains out because she's waiting, legs spread, eyes intense, for him to come back.

He's not coming back.

She's lived across his hall for years, and she looks at him with lust and she beckons to him with pretty, curved fingers when they pass each other, trying to coax him into bed. She blinks her heavy eyelashes at him, butterfly wings of greed and desire. She licks her lips lush and she stokes her nails over the divine sway in her hips. She's the epitome of perfect. She is elegance and taste. She is the definition of angelic. She is sublime.

She is not Daryl.

She is not the lust in Daryl's eyes. She doesn't have his anger and his dirty, calloused, chewed down fingers, or his flaws or the stories carved into the skin he wears. The stories that won't be told, that can't be told, that shouldn't be told. She does not have his glare, his forceful, severe passion. She does not have the glint in his eye that sparks. She does not have the rock in his step or the breath that he hitches.

She is not Daryl.

She is not the reason Shane's in the bathroom, alone and furious. Staring at his reflection with rage and disgust, making excuses. She does not make him hesitate and despise himself and everything around him. Shane does not despise her. Because she is not Daryl.

Daryl makes him hesitate. He's hesitating now.

_I hit you back_

There's a nimble knock at the bathroom door and Shane knows who's standing there, awkwardly, swaying behind it. Her voice is soft and hoarse with filthy longing. She coos through the door and it's muffled by the oak.

"Shane?" she says, "Are you coming to bed?"

'I'm waiting for you.' Shane hears, 'Take me.'

2B, Shane doesn't remember her name, knocks again when he doesn't respond. "Are you alright?"

"M'fine." Shane gruffs out, "I don't feel too well."

He feels fine.

"Oh," 2B doesn't sound impressed. Shane can picture her dainty brows furrowing. "Are you going to be alright?"

"Just dizzy." Shane lies. "I'm going to take a shower." Shane lies.

"Do you," there's an uncertain pause, "need any help?"

"No." Shane lies.

"Is there anyone you want me to call?" 2B sounds worried. She can only look pitifully at a door. "Is there anyone you need to talk to?"

"No." Shane lies. He needs to talk to Daryl. He wants to.

Shane hears 2B lean against the door, breathing on it. If it were a window or a mirror it would fog up. "Are you sure?"

"Yes." Shane lies.

"Do you," another pause, "want me to stay?"

"No." Shane tells the truth.

She leaves, high heels tap, tap, tapping across his hardwood floors. Shane hears her purse jingle with keys and make-up and the door shuts -not slams- and there are no hurt feelings.

The sigh of relief leaves him and his body worn.

The sigh of guilt and vexation catches in his throat.

Daryl's done this to him. He's made Shane weak. He's made Shane vicious and spiteful. He's made Shane a dishonest, disgraceful person.

_You gave a kick_

Daryl is sitting at his little, round dining table when Shane gets to his house. He's got a mug of lukewarm coffee cupped between his palms and he's rolling it slowly on the flat surface, making a rough, grounded sound. He doesn't look over to watch Shane enter, he doesn't acknowledge his existence or his entrance. He's watching dark thunder clouds pass over head silently.

"Looks like it's going to rain." Shane hangs his jacket on one of the rusty hooks behind the door and toes off his shoes. Daryl doesn't look at him. "You have an umbrella handy?" Shane knows Daryl has an umbrella handy. Daryl doesn't answer him anyway.

Shane seats himself on the chair opposite Daryl, the only sound in the room is his stool of choice, which squawks in protest, and the rolling of a mug full of forgotten coffee.

Daryl sniffs and looks down to watch the ants of people run around in the city. His apartment is high up, and the windows do not open, but Shane wonders what it would be like to drop something down there, watch it plummet. He wants to know what the ants' reactions would be. To the pair of salt and pepper shakers on the edge of the table suddenly plopping down to their feet. To the radio in Daryl's kitchen exploding inches away. To a couple of chairs and all of the cheap, chipped, matching sets of Daryl's bowls and plates meeting their demise on pavement.

Daryl's eyes are ice and steel with blue. They reflect the impending storm and Shane's not looking down at the ants and their possible surprises anymore, but he's looking at his eyes, looking into them as best he can when Daryl's refusing to meet his gaze. He wishes he could see them better, wishes Daryl would come closer and Shane doesn't like the way he's thinking.

There's a crinkle in Daryl's eyes like he's smiling, but he's not. His lips are tight and twitching with a snarl. He hums something under his breath and when Shane crooks his head off to the side in question, Daryl repeats himself, cold and clear.

"Ya smell like her perfume."

Shane swallows and coughs and responds, "Who's?"

"Whatever woman ya slept with last." Daryl doesn't call her a slut or a bitch. He says woman, almost respectfully. Carefully.

"I didn't sleep with any woman."

Daryl's eyes don't spark, they dull and die. Shane is killing him.

_I gave a slap_

"I don't know what you're talking about."

Daryl grunts when he stands and he leaves his coffee behind. He's at the door, he's pulling on his jacket, watching Shane with a calculating look. He doesn't say anything, but Shane can see his lips curl around silent, vile comments that are boiling up in his mind, tainting his coal black heart and souring the tip of his tongue. Shane is impressed by his self restraint, but it seems a bit more like a rueful surrender. It seems wrong.

"Where are you going?"

"Out."

"Out where?"

"Out." Daryl says, he spades his foot into a pair of his sneakers and leans down to pull the heel of his shoe out to fit around his ankle. "Wherever you aren't."

"Daryl," Shane's pulling himself to stand. He puts a lot of his emotion into Daryl's name when he says it. He tries to smash all of his unsaid apologies into that one, long tone. He wants to convey everything he's choking down, everything he's holding back. He wants to be able to spit it all out in rhyming poems with a silver tongue. He wants to belt it out in a song, in movement, in anything. He settles for his one word with lots of feelings and repeats it. "Daryl,"

It's not enough and Shane knows it and Daryl knows it and the whole world knows it.

Daryl's front door jams when he tries to open it. It always jams. It needs elbow grease and a quick, patient tug at just the right time to get it open sometimes and the only thing Daryl is not right now is patient. He throttles the handle mercilessly and it jingles like 2B and her peppy step and her keys.

Daryl yanks and he pulls and he huffs and he puffs but the door doesn't budge. He claws and he groans and he silently pleads and the door holds. Daryl rasps his fist against it, cursing it and swearing at it and it does not move. Daryl's getting desperate. He entangles his fingers around cold metal and he draws up all the strength he has left and he jerks his body to move the handle and he gets nothing for his troubles. He tries again, yank, shake. And again, yank, shake. And again, yank, shake.

Shane hears Daryl's forehead drop against the hallow wood and his knuckles clench and release and his breath heavy through his lips, but he doesn't move to help.

_You smashed a plate_

"The door won' open." Daryl's voice is rusty.

"Can I help?" Shane pads over even though Daryl rolls his head over and shoots him with a look that says he can't. Shane covers that hick's hand with his own and they twist the knob over together. He presses his chest up to Daryl's powerful back and his chin above his shoulder blades and they don't pull on the door.

He nuzzles his nose into Daryl's hair and Daryl tenses, feeling Shane's breath on the back of his neck like prey. He curls himself around, dislodging Shane's hold on him and switching it up for being cornered. Shane's not much taller, but he towers.

Shane doesn't lose the grip on his grip on the door knob and suddenly that's too hot. His palm is getting sweaty.

_Over my head_

Daryl wrinkles up his nose and he stares right smack dab in the middle of Shane's chest like he's seeing right though him. Shane's is sort of certain that he is.

There is a moment of just breathing and Shane takes that time to shift his weight side to side. He thinks about Daryl, the way he's dying inside. He wonders if he should set up a funeral for Daryl's lost charge.

Shane's killed Daryl. Daryl hasn't reacted to anything properly in months, and not in the way he used to not react correctly, but in a stranger, unhealthier way. Shane's doing that to him.

"You're going out drinking, aren't you." It's not a question.

Daryl's muscles release lifelessly and Shane's sure Daryl would have dropped to the floor if he wasn't propped up against the door like a puppet.

"You're turning into your father." Shane says it to get a rise out of Daryl. He succeeds.

Shane doesn't know why he does it, he wants to die the second he does, but the when Daryl's pulling away, crouching in on himself in a predator's prowl, Shane strikes. His fingers grip around the belly of Daryl's arm, the one that had pulled out from under his hand defensively, and he pins it against the door. He does this because he's bitter and enraged with the way he's distorted Daryl.

Daryl's eyes go wide for a split moment, and in that moment, Shane can see a sliver of Daryl's spark return and the color spike in brightness. He growls like an animal and tries to rip his arm out from within Shane's knuckles, but he's up against the door and there's not enough leverage room.

Daryl has ugly bubbles of cigarette burns on his wrists and Shane can feel the swollen, old scars when he slips his hand down to stop there. He brushes the pad of his thumb over them and Daryl thrashes, and for just a second Daryl's a dog scared to be put under, or a kid getting shots at the doctors, or a child again, lost somewhere between his father's drunken hazes and his dream of one day proving to everybody, proving to himself, that he can be better.

"Fuck you!" Daryl's voice is raw and riled. Shane can tell Daryl would rip his heart out with words if he could. Shane can tell that Daryl wishes he could. "Fuck you!"

_Then I set fire to our bed_

Shane's picturing Daryl's father twisting the hot embers of cancer sticks into a little boy's skin, holding him in place with strict, violent hands. He pictures Daryl's father on a chair in a run down, not-the-place-to-raise-children shit hole. He pictures Daryl going to bed hungry. He pictures Daryl's father drinking and it's all making him angrier, and his grip is tightening and Daryl reacts.

Daryl has to punch with his free hand -his left hand- and it's not his dominant, so it's weaker. It still throws Shane's head back, and Shane still feels the skin over his cheekbone split and he still feels it plump protectively, immediately.

There's regret on Daryl's face, but it's hidden deep under his obvious fury. His teeth are barred and grit and every once in a while he tugs to free his hand to see if Shane's loosened his hold. He hasn't.

"Let go'a me." it's a warning and it sounds like one. Shane's hand -the one not constraining a loose, wild wrist- lifts soft like feathers to brush Daryl's hair behind his ear. The pads of his fingers tickle at the other's neck and he catches Daryl gently when he tries to turn his face away.

Shane hold Daryl's chin in place, forcing him still and silent. Shane looks for Daryl's spark.

_My black eye casts no shadow_

Daryl's new wave of retaliation is a handful of jerks and a deep scowl. Shane can feel Daryl's muscles tightening and flexing under his fingers.

"I said let go'a me." Daryl's southern side stiffens. The part of him that grew up too close to violence like this stiffens. The bit of him that's scared of being dragged back into it stiffens.

Daryl wrinkles a nose again and snorts unhappily.

"Ya smell like sum woman." it's a hiss, "Ya always smell like sum woman."

"It's not what you think." Shane doesn't say it to make himself look better or to make excuses. He says it because he's sorry.

"Really? Than what is it then!" Daryl has a horrifically beautiful look on his face. "I can't come up with more than one reason yer always coming here reakin'a perfume and shame."

"I never go through with it!"

Daryl stops and his face falls neutral. When he talks again, a whole uncomfortable minute later, his face twists into a look of hatred.

_Your red eye sees no pain_

"'Cause tha' makes it all fuckin' better!" Daryl gnashes his teeth with his sarcasm, "Hey, my fiance's runnin' aroun' with strange women, but hey, at least he's not shoving his dick in them, too!"

Shane has a quarrel with that, because that's not fair. "Because you are so fucking faithful, Daryl."

"What tha fuck is tha' supposed to mean."

Shane knows Daryl is loyal. Daryl is always home when he is supposed to be. He never disappears. He's never out late. He never looks guilt ridden. He always smells of himself. Of gardens and his strange Irish soap.

"You know what I mean!" Shane's shout is accusingly and Shane doesn't even know what he means.

"No. I don't!" Daryl barks, "All I know is that ya have no fuckin' clue what yer talkin' 'bout! And yer a whore! A slut! Or whatev'a tha fuckin' man equivalent 'a tha' is!"

Shane thunders, "You couldn't do better than me!" and he doesn't mean it. He says, "You don't deserve better than me!" and he regrets it.

_Your slaps don't stick_

Daryl goes real quiet. It's deafening.

"You really think you can do better?" Shane continues because he doesn't know how to apologize. "You think you'll ever find someone that will care about you enough to make you happy?" Shane wants to make Daryl happy. "Do you really think that anyone will find you worth more than the garbage in the streets?" Shane's panicking. "Do you really think with these" -Shane thrashes Daryl around enough to flash him the dozen burns on the wrist in his grips, he reaches down with his free hand and lifts Daryl's shirt to expose years of torment, scars on top of scars; a damaged body- "anyone can ever really love you?"

Shane says this because now Daryl wont leave. Because now Daryl doesn't have anywhere to go.

"You just have me." Shane's hand returns to cup Daryl's cheek and he moves himself and he moves Daryl until their foreheads rest against each other. Daryl has his eyes closed, refusing to look at Shane.

"I'd rather be alone." Daryl says simply. Blindly. He doesn't open his eyes to watch Shane's reaction, he can feel it, though, in his imprisoned wrist when Shane's hand clenches with a bruising force.

Shane has his eyes open and they're widened with outrage and fear. "You will die alone. Unloved."

"I can live with that." Daryl says, and finally, just as the last words leave his lips, he opens his eyes resiliently. "Can you?"

_Your kicks don't hit_

Shane strikes out. That's all he knows. Violence and sex.

The sound of the punch is loud, but it's the sound of the back of Daryl's head smacking against the door that echoes. Shane hears a crack and he can't tell if it's bone or wood.

Daryl slides half a foot down the wall before Shane catches him. He has to drop Daryl's wrist.

As soon as the dizziness rushes away and the ringing in his ears settles, Daryl is on the offensive. He plants his jumbled feet flat when he remembers how and he holds up his own weight when he figures out he can and he sets his palms on Shane's chest and they're warm. His shove is violent and Shane's tumble is even more so.

_So we remain the same_

Shane's back hits the ground with an audible thump and Daryl is on top of him in a flash, landing a couple of solid hits on the bigger man before the positions are switched and Shane's on top.

There's blood smeared over Daryl's lips and his front teeth, dripping from his nose and a cut in his mouth. The color is almost as sickening as the look of betrayal and animalistic fury on Daryl's shocked face.

"I didn't mean to do that!" Shane tries to help stop the bleeding and Daryl's smacking his prying fingers away indubitably. It frustrates Shane to no end. He tells himself it's Daryl's own fault when he restrains him, and he tells himself it's still Daryl's fault when he finds himself binding tender skin on tender wrists. He uses the cord on the phone and he ties his dirty knots tight.

_Blood sticks, sweat drips_

Shane scrubs a thumb over Daryl's lips, trying to rid the other from the blotchy red stains. He spreads it around a little more, he hears Daryl hiss when he presses too hard, he makes a mess of everything and he doesn't help one bit. Daryl is trying to pry away from Shane's unwelcome touch, but he's getting nowhere.

"I didn't mean that." Shane sits up and puts his weight on his folded knees instead of Daryl's stomach. "I didn't mean that."

"Which part." Daryl snarls, "Tha part where ya told me I was a disgusting wreck or tha part where ya broke ma nose."

"You're not a disgusting wreck." Shane says apologetically, "You're not a disgusting anything."

Daryl spits, "Thanks."

"What I said wasn't true." Shane strokes his hand over Daryl's chin, wiping a stream of sticky crimson away. "You know how I get."

Shane can see exactly where his ring hit Daryl by the imprint. He can see where the skin has split on Daryl's upper lip. It's still gushing blood.

Daryl's mouth twitches in contempt and there's a twinge of loathing in the way he breathes his ragged breaths. "Go ta hell."

"Fuck," Shane runs a hand over his scalp and he forgets about the blood on it. He tries to undo the ties binding Daryl's arms over his head but he cut his nails recently and it's hard.

Shane hates when he panics. He hates the way he acts. He hates his impulses. He hates that every single time Daryl gets the worst of it. He hates that Daryl looks like he's used to it.

"I'm so sorry." Shane whispers so softly. He's not sure if Daryl hears it. "So, so sorry."

_Break the lock if it don't fit_

The knots come undone one at a time, and each one is a challenge. He can see indents of wire over Daryl's old cigarette burns. They look like more scars.

Daryl rubs circulation and feeling back into his limbs and he's calm because Shane's calm and Shane's sorry. He glares up at the bigger man but there's no real fire behind it.

"We should get you patched up." Shane moves to stand up, but when he sees that Daryl makes no move to join him he settles back into his spot.

Daryl's staring up at him with eyes that have long ago learned how to hide what he's thinking.

"What's wrong?"

Daryl blinks long and slow, "I think you're right."

"About what?"

"I think I'm goin'a die alone." Daryl admits in a raspy voice, "I don' think anyone could love me." Shane watches Daryl circle his cigarette burns on one wrist with a finger on the other. It's subtle and he tries to hide it, and Shane feels shame watching. "I don' think anybody could love me."

Shane's not sure why he says it again, but he hates that Daryl said it at all.

"That's ridiculous." Shane swats Daryl's hands apart, "I'm ridiculous for saying that. I'm a piece of shit. I am..."

Daryl shifts.

"I am the worst type of human being alive." Shane finishes. "And I don't deserve to breathe the same air you do. I don't deserve to walk on the same ground as you. I don't deserve to share the same continent as you. I don't deserve to touch you."

Daryl isn't one for sweet talk, and though the circumstances really cancel out any romance to the words, they are still Shane's version of compliments, and Daryl's never been good with those. He pulls a face and he winces. "You don't."

Shane laughs out his nose. "I'm a bastard."

"Yes."

"I'm an asshole."

"Yes."

"I'm the only one here that deserves to die alone."

Daryl doesn't say anything.

_A kick in the teeth is good for some_

Shane doesn't want to feel this way for Daryl. He doesn't want to feel anything for Daryl. Daryl deserves so much better then him.

Shane wants to pack up his things a leave Daryl. He wants Daryl to find someone else. He wants Daryl to be with someone who will treat him right, treat him how he needs to be treated, how he should be treated. Shane wants to sleep soundly, he wants to think clearly, to fuck carelessly, to breathe normally and more importantly, Shane wants Daryl to be happy.

Daryl can't have any of that with Shane around.

Shane wants Daryl so bad because he's selfish.

Shane wants Daryl so bad because Daryl is perfect.

Daryl is priceless.

Daryl is everything.

Daryl is the one to initiate the kiss and his lips taste of iron and scorn. Shane kisses back without a problem. Daryl's forgiven him. Daryl's forgotten about it. Daryl's making him. Shane doesn't deserve any of it and he knows it.

_A kiss with a fist is better than none_

XxxX

**A/N-** I know the songs not really about domestic abuse, so yeah.

I'm getting a puppy tomorrow... awww...!

I had more to say, but while I was editing I forgot. Speaking of editing, though, it's 5 in the morning and I haven't slept in fucking _forever_, so excuse the mistakes. Point them out to me, maybe? Thanks for reading, you guys are great!


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